Modelling Self-Regulation
Self-regulation is the process whereby learners exert control over their actions and thoughts.
This control helps them to be more successful.
They can direct their attention and their focus, perhaps by talking to themselves via an interior monologue, or maybe by switching their approach to help themselves keep going.
Here are some examples of self-regulation:
- A learner reminds themselves that they need to retain focus when they feel their mind start to wander during a maths lesson.
- A rugby player is about to join a maul when they stop themselves and take up a defensive position based on what the opposition are doing.
- A Year 4 learner looks at the clock to see how long they have left to finish their work. They speed up as a result.
- A teacher feels themselves spending too long with a specific group of learners. They make a conscious effort to talk to a wider range of pupils.
- A Year 11 learner immediately starts writing an essay answer in an exam. They stop themselves, spend thirty seconds thinking up a rough plan, and then continue.
In each example we see the individual taking control of their own behaviour and, through this, giving themselves a better chance of achieving the goal they are working towards.
Self-regulation is a form of metacognition because it involves us being aware of our own thinking, including the limitations that might form part of that thinking.
Armed with this self-knowledge, we are in a position from which to make positive changes should we find ourselves going off-track or doing things in the short-term that run counter to our longer-term goals.
All this leads us to the conclusion that self-regulation is good, that it can be learned, and that learners who can do it are going to be in a better position from which to persist and keep going than learners who can’t do it yet.
For this reason, modelling self-regulation is a great technique to use in the classroom.
It sees you demonstrating to learners how they can keep a check on their thinking – and what they can do if they find themselves going off-track.
Done repeatedly, it helps learners develop an understanding of how to regulate their own actions and behaviour.
It also draws learners’ attention to the malleability of their own minds and the potential for growth inherent to all of us.
Cognitive Tools
Cognitive tools are anything and everything that allow you to broaden the scope of your mind.
This broad definition means we could include libraries, the internet and chalk.
Libraries contain a store of information created by minds other than our own, with this information transcending time and space by being captured in books, facilitated by the existence of the alphabet.
The internet allows us to access information in a similar manner to the library only with greater scope, greater speed and in a wider variety of formats.
Chalk allows us to make notes or signs, helping us to remember or keep track of things that we might otherwise forget.
While the definition is broad, the theme is narrow.
Cognitive tools help us to go beyond the limits of our own minds.
We can think of a subset of these tools being available for classroom use.
Here is a list of examples:
- Dictionaries
- Thesauruses
- Crib Sheets
- Formulae Sheets
- Calculators
- Scrap Paper
- Mini-Whiteboards
- Rough Books
- Counting Blocks
- Protractors
- Rulers
- Mnemonics
- Mind-Maps
- Fingers (for counting off a series of items)
In each case, proficiency in using the tool means the learner can do more than they could do without it.
This is all about learning how to use tools to solve problems, to think and, ultimately, as strategies.
Take mini whiteboards as an example.
These provide a great space in which learners can make mistakes, refine ideas, and temporarily store information.
Using a mini-whiteboard means the learner frees up space in their working memory.
This, in turn, means they don’t become overloaded, lessening the chance they will withdraw from the work or find the challenge too much.
Training learners in how to use different cognitive tools is therefore an excellent way to promote metacognition, particularly if you draw learners’ attention to what is happening when they use a tool, and why this is to their benefit.
You might also want to draw a connection between their use of a tool and how this shapes their thinking.
An easy way to do this is to give learners a complex problem and ask them to solve it using only their minds.
After a few minutes, ask them to use a pencil and some scrap paper as a supporting tool.
The difference – physically and mentally – will be immediately obvious.
Finally, it should be noted that different cognitive tools wax and wane in their importance at different times.
As a literate adult I find that I only need to use a dictionary occasionally – a learner in Year Five may use it rather more often.
This also intimates how cognitive tools can be seen through the lens of scaffolding.
As the learning to which they give rise becomes embedded, so, in many cases, may use of the scaffold start to decline.
